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"Music may achieve the highest of all mission: she may be a bond between nations, races, and states, who are strangers in many ways; she may unite what is disunited and bring peace to what is hostile."

Dr. Max Bendiner

"Legyen a zene mindenkié!"

"Let the music be everybody's!"

Kodály Zoltán

"A zene az emberiség univerzális nyelve."

“Music is the universal language of mankind”

Longfellow

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"Back when I was just a boy, I was desperate to discover that new and unfathomable thing called music. Digging through all of the mysterious devices in the forboding dust of our basement, one day I discovered an old AM radio. With its fake- wood peeling off and single dial, it would always play better when I was touching it. I'd lay there in the darkness of my bedroom, trying to comprehend the tinny sound coming out, songs played by the DJs relegated to the radio wasteland of the dial that counted frequencies in the hundred and tens.

One evening at 9:05 PM I heard the song "The Devil Came Down To Georgia" and everything changed. I listened to that station every night thereafter at 9:05 PM in search of the song, my tiny mind seeking order in the chaos of radio. I eventually moved on to other things, but I never really forgot that fantastic song.

Perhaps it was the sinister content, the endless struggle between good and evil set to raucous southern fable that grabbed me, perhaps it was the otherwordly fiddle. I may never know. What I do know is that the memory of that song rose up like a redneck on malt liquor the moment I turned on Sixteen Horsepower's Low Estate. 13 tracks of fiddle, bass, bandoneon, drums, concertina, hurdy gurdy and cello, blended into a thoroughly sinister mix that speaks directly back to my AM radio and the feeling you get in a southern graveyard when you hear the wolves in the distance.

Low Estate is packed with dark, forboding images, both lyriaclly and instrumentally. Moaning cello telling a tale of ghostly "Phillys Ruth," a slightly picked guitar recounting a hanging, it's pure frontier storytelling that somehow reached my ears through a century of waiting. Deep country roots, fed by the blood of our ancestral criminals, prospectors and cowboys, Low Estate exhibits a true American originality so rare in a country obsessed with looking forward and forgetting the past."

Formed in 1991, the Egschliglen (translating loosely as "Beautiful Melody") project aims to take the traditional rhythms and instrumentation of Mongolian folk music and adapt them for contemporary listening - adding innovation, experimentation and playfulness to the mix, rather than simply playing their way note-for-note through the ancient standards.

Central to this is the art of "koommii", traditional Mongolian "throat-singing", which evolved as a way of imitating the sounds of nature, such as the mountains, the rivers and the wind. So far, so romantic. However, to Western ears, this deep, resonating overtone growl can be somewhat hard work, and rather than evoking the wide, open plains of Mongolia, instead conjures up images of Hanna Barbera's Captain Caveman creation in the throes of a heavy bout of food-poisoning, or something from a Reeves and Mortimer sketch.

The album often works best when the koomii is given a bit of respite. The epic, cinematic "Nutgiin Zamd" builds beautifully, ending up where Chinese and Russian folk-music meets a Sergio Leone Western soundtrack. On slower pieces such as "Huurhun Haliun", the slightly discordant soundscape even draws parallels with the violin-heavy sounds of the first Velvet Underground album. Final track "Bau'rin" even re-works a childlike Bavarian peasant-song in the Mongolian-style, and it works like a dream.

Gereg is a genuinely intriguing and overall rewarding release - just figure out your stance on Mongolian throat-singing in advance.

The Orchestra developed in 2007 of his Aprils as a Transylvanian-Hungarian co-production. Jazz, funky and anything else meld the Hungarian folk music with elements in their music.

"We were born with the 2007 spring awakening with dreams of growth and experiences. Our longing for music does not consist of mysteries, philosophies, only of joy; but from the moment of this publicity attempt, the comments, feedbacks and community/common experiences are also determining for us. We set out from Transylvania, and hope to reach both further regions and souls close to us. Recive our cd just the way we made it, with love."

"New York-based band Firewater, incorporated a global range of musical influences into their highly-dynamic sound. A loosely-knit ensemble centered around the lead vocals of ex-Cop Shoots Cop bass player Tod A. (born: Tod Ashley), Firewater tied together such influences as Klezmer, Indian wedding music, art-punk, and Tom Waits-style cabaret poetry to create their heady, often quite danceable sound. Coupled with Tod A.'s acerbic, post-apocalyptic, and death-obsessed lyrics, Firewater was a band to be reckoned with almost from the beginning.

Shortly after forming in 1995, Firewater released its debut, Get Off The Cross (We Need The Wood For The Fire). Both it and 1998's The Ponzi Scheme featured guitarist Duane Denison of Jesus Lizard, drummer Yuval Gabay of Soul Coughing and saxophone and accordion player Kurt Hofmann of the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. The sultry vocals of Elsyian Fields' Jennifer Charles also drifted through both albums. Charles returned for 2001's more pop-oriented Psychopharmacology; other contributions came from saxophonist Ori Kaplan and sitar player Oren Bloedow. In 2003, Tod A. and his "wedding band gone wrong" returned with a stripped-down, razor-wire-wrapped effort for Jetset entitled The Man on the Burning Tightrope. The covers album Songs We Should Have Written appeared early the following year. Tod A. then went on an extended trek through Thailand, India, Pakistan, Turkey and Indonesia, which he chronicled on his blog Postcards from the Other Side of the World. A. also recorded music on his travels, collaborating with producer Tamir Muskat and local musicians along the way. The results were The Golden Hour, which Bloodshot Records released in spring 2008."

"In photography, the golden hour is when the sunlight is at the perfect angle to capture beautiful images; in the medical world, it's the window of time where a life can still be saved after severe injuries. Both meanings could apply to The Golden Hour, Firewater's first album of original material in four years: it's a musical travelogue of the three years Tod A. spent in India, Turkey, Pakistan, and Indonesia (which he also chronicled in the blog Postcards from the Edge of the World) after his divorce and the reelection of President George W. Bush in 2004, and each song is like a vibrant, sometimes violent, snapshot along the way. A.'s travels were no vacation -- if anything, there's a sharper edge to his songwriting here than in years, and combined with the contributions of local musicians from each country, The Golden Hour is some of Firewater's most consistently potent music. The album underscores its concept by kicking off with "Borneo," a jaunty, pissed-off exit song listing all the reasons for leaving the U.S. ("You got a monkey for a president" is near the top) with theatrical flair, and from there, A. and crew -- including drummer/producer Tamir Muskat of Balkan Beat Box -- find ways to dance on their troubles with quintessentially Firewater songs like "Hey Clown," "Already Gone," and "Three Legged Dog." The band ups the ante with "This Is My Life," where the tumba, chimta, and dholki of the native musicians (many of whom normally play in the backing bands for belly dancers) add an extra spark to the song's already fiery rhythm. But for every brash moment on The Golden Hour, there is an equally vulnerable one, whether it's the cautionary tales of "Paradise" and "A Place Not So Unkind" or "Six Forty Five," an elegant ballad filled with emptiness as it wanders from sunset to sunrise. On "Weird to Be Back," Tod A. notes that "everything's the same or maybe just a little worse," but that can't be said of The Golden Hour -- it's some of Firewater's angriest, most poignant, and most accomplished music."

All Music Guide

Reviews:

"Melodic Eastern European-flavored gypsy rock, Indian and Middle Eastern percussion, hypnotic sarangi solos... the album is a biting travelogue, the rantings of a surly castaway among the noble savages."

01. Borneo02. This Is My Life03. Some Kind of Kindness04. 6-45 (So This Is How It Feels)05. A Place Not So Unkind06. Paradise07. Bhangra Bros08. Electric City09. Hey Clown10. Already Gone11. Feels Like the End of the World12. Weird To Be Back13. Three Legged Dog

On their previous releases, Rumba Argelina and Temporal, Radio Tarifa explored the network of musical connections between North Africa and Spain. With this release, they burrow ever deeper into the music, tracing not only the roots of flamenco-check out the foot percussion on "Patas Negras" to hear the Moorish antecedents of a very Spanish sound-but going back as far as the Renaissance with "Si J'ai Perdu Mon Ami," with its rich oboe sound. There's even "Gujo Bushi," a Japanese tune that they make fit into the overall idea. The biggest musical change is the use of electric guitar, which can seem jarring at first. But this is robust music that's lived for centuries on both sides of the Mediterranean, and it can adapt to all manner of ideas-something Radio Tarifa have in abundance with their imaginative arrangements and strong sense of melody. Where the hypnotic senses of Moroccan trance music meet the passion of flamenco, bridging space and time, that's where you'll find Radio Tarifa.

Čompe was established in 1994. Its music probes street language as well as Slovene modern poetry (including several poems written by Dane Zajc, Milan Jesih, Edvard Kocbek and Andrej Rozman-Roza), and reflects irony as well as joie de vivre, music virtuosity and dilettantism, revolution and devolution with zeal and humour. Čompe's musical expression is characterised by the blending together of a range of different genres including, apart from folk-like music, chanson, jazz, cabaret and rock music.

Pure Transylvanian Folk Music - this is the folk music that people who live in Transylvania listen to.Panek Kati and Bodzafa means the same for Transylvanian as Márta Sebestyén means for Hungary.Kati was one of the founders of the dance house movement in Transylvania and also of the Bodzafa (The Elder Tree) Band. During the Ceaucescu regime, the Elder Tree members emigrated and became leading musicians in Hungary.For over 20 years Kati has been an actress in the Hungarian Theatre of Kolozsvár (Cluj). It has been 15 years since the Elder Tree released their last album in Transylvania, now they have come together again to record this new album - an album of pure Transylvanian Folk Music.Be sure and check out the solo release by the violinist featured on this CD Papp István "Gázsa".

Cicala Mvta (pronounced shikala moota) are one of Japan's most exciting and original groups. Like other innovative musicians, their music is hard to define; "punk chindon jazz", "world and noise band to clarinet in a chindon group. Colorful chindon groups used to be a common sight in Japan, marching in the streets noisily banging a chindon drum, while saxophones or clarinets would pick out the melody to the hits of the day. Ohkuma tramped the streets of Tokyo for 7 years playing clarinet as part of a spluttering tradition, until the late 80s when together with the group Compostella he started to revive chindon music by mixing it with other elements. While Japan is the only eastern country to have so readily absorbed western music, street performances of wind and percussion instruments can be found all over the world. As an "unmilitarized" street music, chindon is related to Jewish Klezmer music, New Orleans brass bands and wind and percussion ensembles from China and south east Asia. Ohkuma is as keen to embrace these influences in the music of Cicala Mvta. "In my opinion, old jazz , klezmer or wedding brass band traditions, from India to the Balkans, are all similar to chindon as an early modern mixture music . These are all clarinet musics, so it's very natural for me to play these types together" he says.

Ohkuma's other disparate influences help give Cicala Mvta their own distinctive sound. These he cites as progressive rock, punk, avant-garde jazz, early modern music (such as Bartok) and folk. Only occasionally featuring the chindon drum, Ohkuma's perky clarinet is ably abetted by an unusual line-up of musicians, each bringing with them a sense of individuality to supplement Ohkuma's clarinet and saxophone, in what is a totally original line-up; fluid, distorted electric guitar, rip-roaring, booming tuba, squeaking, screeching cello, frantic, discordant fiddle, and tinny, shuffling drums. "Deko Boko" is Cicala Mvta's second album and a progression on their self titled first CD. The mixtures are more radical than ever, and the tunes self penned by Ohkuma and arranged by the group. Both traditional chindon and the retro-futuristic sound of Cicala Mvta are an entirely natural combination of the old and new, the east with the west.

Cicala Mvta is one of only a few Japanese groups, to have created a 'buzz' in other countries. Their first overseas gig in 2000 was supporting Blur in London, afterwhich they toured for 6 weeks, playing to enthusiastic audiences at festivals throughout Europe. Despite being instrumental, their music is not without a message. The band's name, Italian for a 'mute cicada', derives from the epitaph written on the gravestone of Soeda Azembo (1872 -1944) the greatest street singer and songwriter of popular music in Japan before the 1920s. "His songs were banned and he was repeatedly thrown into prison. They tried to break his spirit and make him really mute" explains Ohkuma. Cicala Mvta and chindon music too, is not about to go quietly.

The Karavan familia Gipsy world music and folk group plays traditional folk music arrangements from the different dialects of their native culture with individual effects and sounds. They have in their performances Gipsy music not only from Hungary, but from the Balkans, Romania, Russia and from Spain – formed to their own style.

The group was formed by István Nagy in 2002. He was born 1969 in Budapest. He taught himself and was influenced by various kinds of folk music and the afro American blues. When he was 15 he was already performing as a blues-musician. (guitar & blues harmonica)

At the end of the 1980’s he connected to the Hungarian Gipsy folklore movement. In 1989 joined the Romanyi Rota ensemble, with which he worked for 13 years. (He did different arrangements, wrote lyrics in Gipsy Romani language, and he was one of the main singers of the group, he played guitar, bouzouki, mandolin, tambura and wooden spoons.) As a member of the band he was awarded the Hungarian distinction of 'Young Master of Folk Arts' in 1995. He made two CDs with the mentioned group which are till nowadays the most authentic Gipsy folk records. (Romanyi Rota: O cerhariko – 1994 Etnofon; Romanyi Rota: Phiravelman kalyi phuv – 1999 Fonó Records)

Simultaneously he was one of the founded members of the Gipsy band of Romano Kokalo with the famous Gipsy cimbalom player, Kálmán Balogh. The two musicians combined their artistic manner and so Romano Kokalo was converted the most progressive Hungarian Gipsy band in the end of the 1990’s.

"The soundtrack to the film of the same name by Andreas Dresen was created much like the film itself and above all – very unusually – along with the film.

“Halbe Treppe” had no fixed written script. The actors and film team lived in Frankfurt/ Oder for three months, filming several scenes and in the evenings looking at what they had come up with and thinking about how the story might be continued the following day.

We joined them in Frankfurt/Oder from time to time, each time bringing new songs, which Andreas used directly for the filmed scenes. Thus the music suddenly helped decide which direction the story was to take: melancholic, happy, hopeless or uplifting…"

So many excellente musicians on one recording! "Composer-musician M. Montanaro, with Vents d'Est, rewrites the geographical map of Europe with jazz and folk music, Czech, Slovak, Serb, Hungarian or French violins and harmonies are laced sometimes with swing sometimes with sacred music."

Suburban Bucharest unites magnificent voices and virtuous fiddlers. It is telling us about musical occasions and their places, the constant changing of prevailing taste, and about the imminent end of the old Lautari-Music in Romania.

Suburban Bucharest is dealing with musical influences from Serbia, Turkey and the Middle East, which the political dignitaries like to apostrophy as the pollution of Romanian music. In the past few years the improvised bars of corrugated iron in the suburbs of Bucharest, for the most part concrete buildings, have been torn down. Along with them the venues of the most Gipsy Bands vanished for ever - and only a handful of them had been lucky to be discovered.

“An eye opener!”

Charlie Gillett, BBC

“One of the best discs I‘ve heard in 2004 - in any genre.”

Simon Broughton, Songlines

“Another superb compilation from Trikont, this time showcasing the effervescent gypsy music of Romanian capital Bucharest, a city composed of "hundreds of sprawling villages that have grown together." Charismatic singers abound: Romica Puceanu (died in 1996) has the skills of an Ella Fitzgerald, while Maria Tanase (from the 1930s) was more of a Judy Garland figure, bringing night-club flair to folkloric material. The muted trumpet of Costel Vasilescu is a high point, spinning dizzily over a wildly swung Hora wedding dance, clanked out by cimbalom, fiddle and fluttering accordion. The tension between traditional sounds and modern pop is endlessly renegotiated - godfather of gypsy pop Dan Armeanca sings both with his coolly modern group and the pumping brass of Fanfare Ciocârlia. Finally there's the exuberant filigree of Taraf De Haidouks, a group ignored in Romania until international acclaim propelled them into surreal situations such as modelling for designer Yoji Yamamoto.”

Joanne Shenandoah is a beautiful woman with a beautiful soul. Fittingly, she also has a beautiful voice with which she expresses her spirit and heart. Orenda, an Iroquois word meaning "the soul of all things," features her sweet vocals in harmony with Lawrence Laughing. She sings these ceremonial songs in their native languages. The instrumental accompaniment, by Tom Wasinger and Mark McCoin, is subtle and low-key. This is Shenandoah's CD. Her gentle style is both dynamic and serene. It fills the heart and soul of the listener. Laughing's harmonies are smooth and graceful.

"Multitalented, award-winning composer and musician Joanne Shenandoah gets better with every album. On Orenda, the singer and instrumentalist, herself of Iroquois descent, is joined by Mohawk Lawrence Laughing; and their duets, including "Deer Dance" and "Unity," are among the album's strongest tracks. Shenandoah's voice is a rare gift; on Orenda, it's rich and clear, and never falters. The mix of backing instruments works well, including several percussion and wind instruments as well as guitars, while the spare arrangements allow Shenandoah's and Laughing's voices to stand out. The blend of the traditional and the contemporary in her music works very well indeed, bringing out the best of both."

Since the Eighties, five men and two women from the northern French town of Angers have gelled together into a music community with an invented name, Lo’Jo. This group brings together sounds culled during their endless globe-trotting performances. Reggae, Arabic dance, French folk music and Paris trance all fuse to bring a deeply political message of multi-cultural tolerance and curiosity best enjoyed live.

"I've loved the sound of Lo'Jo from the first time I laid ears on them. They're funky and danceable, though ominous clouds always lurk on their horizon. Their music blends the circus and the city, North Africa and Europe, village and nightclub. This generous 26-song best-of compilation includes cuts from last year's Bazar Savant all the way back to 1993's Fils de Zamal. Even if you can't tell what they're singing, you can appreciate Denis Péan's dark growl, the unique vocal harmonies of sisters Yamina and Nadia Nid El Mourid, and the tight sound of Lo'Jo collective of musicians. Among the tracks are some of our favorites -- including "Senor Calice" and "Sin Acabar" -- along with some songs new to us, such as the reggae-tinged "Woman Intuition," which appeared on the 1994 Lo'Jo EP G7 of Destruction and Artisans of Peace. If you don't know Lo'Jo, this compilation will remedy that in short order. If you do, it's still a worthwhile addition to your collection. Get it direct from France if you have to, but by all means support this wonderful collective of musicians and the conscious global music they're creating!"

"One of the earlier entries on the market of African blues-inflected music offerings, this album from the folks at Rough Guide is most certainly African, but not particularly fusion in the sense of incorporating the American blues idiom. What one does have here, though, is a relatively early collection of the people that would in large be the most notable figures on the field of African music on the greater world market. Ismaël Lo opens up the album, followed by Rokia Traoré. After a couple of East African entries, the first true blues piece comes courtesy of Ali Farka Toure's hit "Heygana." The great mbira player Stella Chiweshe makes an appearance, as does Hamza el Din, with some bluesy riffs on the oud from the North. Boubacar Traoré puts in the second entirely valid piece of American-esque blues, and the team of Kante Manfila and Balla et Ses Balladins present an excerpt of the Kankan Blues phenomenon. Finishing the album are two more notables: Cape Verde's Césaria Évora, and Mali's up and coming Oumou Sangare, both worth hearing in their own right. Throughout, the album strays a bit from its most apparent mission, but the music remains worthwhile regardless. A fine choice for a quick sampler of the bigger names in African music."

Sara Alexander is a unique artist. An artist in musical terms, of course, a splendid musician (accordion and guitar), singer and composer, who has recorded and worked the world over. But also, an artist of life, full of curiosity, joie de vivre, and most of all, full of tolerance and understanding of human nature. Born in Israel of a Romanian, Jewish, gypsy father and a Turkish Jewish mother, Sara took to music at an early age, absorbing all the influences from the surrounding Arab culture as well as from the Jewish immigration, bringing with it songs from all over the world. She can count on the complicity of musicians that are, like her, travellers from different origins, and who master the arabesques of the oud, the saz or the ney as brilliantly as they play various electronic instruments. Her warm, deep voice, which is that of an oriental blues singer, and her sensitive and luminous accordion play walk the confines of Greece, Turkey, Spain and North Africa, melting all into an imaginary country where gypsy passion, oriental languor, klezmer humour and contemporary composition grow into something new and original. Sara started travelling with her music early on, and has lived in Europe for many years now, never forgetting about the problems in the part of the world from which she has come, and doing all she could to help contribute to the understanding between the people, especially between Israelis and Palestinians. For her engagement, that made her meet with many personalities from the political and social world, she has had much recognition (from the UN, from the French government that awarded her the Legion d’Honneur, from the Smithsonian Institute that made her a laureate, and many more). She will never stop pursuing in her quest of mutual understanding, and as we all know, music is the best way to communicate across borders and language barriers.

Her album “Café Turc” is strongly anchored in the traditions of the people around the Mediterranean Sea, but also inspired by the Balkan musical tradition, assembles instrumentalists from Turkey, Greece, France, and Italy. Dream of a Gypsy cabaret in Istanbul, add some modern, arab, jewish & indian influences. There, you've got a bitter & sweet Turkish Coffee for a journey till the end of the night.

Ökrös, undoubtedly one of the leading folk music ensembles today, play mainly Transylvanian folk music. Led by the brilliant violinist Csaba Ökrös, they are one of the best interpreters of this type of folk music and on this new release are joined by other musicians of equal excellence: Kálmán Balogh on Cimbalom, Aladár Csiszár on violin, and Ágnes Herczku on vocals.

The theme of this recording is one of the most famous Hungarian folksongs. The song "I Left My Sweet Homeland" became the most important symbol and "song of belonging" to Hungarians living in Hungary. Also to the millions of emigrants who were forced to leave their homeland; and to other millions who, due to the turbulent border changes of the twentiest century, found themselves in their own homes as "citizens" of an alien land.

"The Ökrös Ensemble, led by the brilliant violinist Csaba Ökrös, are probably the finest interpreters of Transylvanian village music in the world. On I Left My Sweet Homeland, the five regular members of the ensemble are joined by Aladár Csiszár, a Gypsy violinist who is one of the last great players of traditional village music; Ágnes Herczku, a young singer who is one of the leading figures in the Hungarian folk music revival; and Kálmán Balogh, one the most accomplished cymbalom players in Europe. On tracks such as "Rábaközi Karéj, dus, Csárdás és Friss," a collection of dance tunes that features the ringing tones of Balogh's cymbalom, or the "Máramarosi Román és cigány Dallamok," a medley of Gypsy tunes, the band navigates the intricate rhythms and complex melodies with aplomb. But the finest moments on this collection come when Herczku steps up to the microphone. Whether she is singing a lively melody like "Csingerálás (The Gypsy Jumping Dance)" or the moving a cappella lament "I Left My Sweet Homeland," she infuses the music with a passion that is rarely equaled."

Formed at the beginning of the 90s at the Ulan Bator conservatory in Mongolia by four young instrumentalists, Egschiglen (Beautiful melody) with their new album Zazal once again propose a wide repertory that embraces both the tradition and modernity of their country, for which they have become renowned musical ambassadors. Over the years the group has learned how to harness their cultural heritage (especially shamanic, lamaic and epic chants) and fuse it with more modern instrumental trends creating musical structures that are aesthetically up to date without having to rely on hybridization with foreign elements. The music on Zazal (a propitiatory rite practised when a member of the family leaves on a long journey) is extremely luminous and free, achieving a perfect balance between tradition and modernity, stasis and movement. The traditional instruments used are the main force behind the shaping of the groups sound...however, what will probably be the biggest surprise to the listener is the originality of the khmi chant. This is a highly peculiar technique that requires complete mastery of the voice which is subjected to various acrobatics to hold together both a drone and different harmonics with the result that miraculous sounds both deep and vertiginously acute are simultaneously emitted from the singers throat.

"From Mongolia comes a new fantastic cd by the group Egschiglen. Although they are not as known as Huun Huur tu and Yat-kha, this group is at least as good as both of these bands. Their last cd was released five years ago and for me that cd was my first meeting with the Mongolian traditional music. Their new cd Zazal is a masterpiece and a big leap forward comparing with their last cd. Fresh arrangements and a strong mixture between tradition and modern acoustic music. Besides their famous singing techniques they use traditional instruments such as the Morin khuur, a horse-headed violin which is played like a cello, the Yoochin which relates to the dulcimer and the Thobshuur which is a two-string lute. Their music is sometimes hypnotising like in the song Yamaanii boodog which consists of the Khoomi chant sounding like they swallowed a few flutes, and intriguing rhythms. Egschiglen also has a female singer which is rather unique, at least I hardly ever heard a female singer in traditional Mongolian music before. The album is very friendly for the ear and can also be enjoyed by people who would like to be introduced to the intriguing music of Mongolia. I had to wait five years for their new album but it's more than worth waiting for. Egschiglen delivered the best album of 2002 so far."

"Latvia's folk revival is a pretty recent phenomenon, dating from only the early 1980's. It began as a reaction to the Soviet occupation and continued to grow along with the country's independence movement. ILGI was formed at the beginning of the revival by singer/violinist Ilga Reizniece and has gone on to release eight albums. The group uses traditional folk song as a springboard for rock, jazz, and new age experimentation. Using traditional and contemporary instruments, they create a sound that is both fresh and ancient. Each song is like a miniature fable, telling a short but evocative story using imagery from folk culture and the natural world.

The lyrics have a colorful atavistic poetry that says more in a few short verses than many lengthy ballads do. They are set to music that has an anthemic sweep and rock-inspired drive. Vilnis Strods' assertive drumming provides a propulsive underpinning for the mix of hammered dulcimer, bagpipes, fiddle, jaw harp, electric guitar and bass. Each track has a unique personality created by varying mixes of instruments and no fewer than six different vocalists (three of them guests), each with his or her own timbre and take on the music. The sexually suggestive "Es Guleju Maigu Miegu" (I was a light sleeper) is one of the most driving tracks on the release, with fast-paced alternating male and female vocals over swirling fiddle and bagpipe. "Runa Laudis, Ko Runa" (People Are Gossiping) has a quieter, vaguely jazzy 6/8 sweep. Latvia has a fine group of musical ambassadors in this versatile, skilled ensemble."

The album features the voices of Ilga Reizniece, Maris Muktupavels, Gatis Gaujenieks and Ruta Muktupavela, Ilga’s mesmerizing violin, Maris on kokle, dudas (bagpipes), accordion and recorder, Gatis on bass and giga, Egons Kronbergs on guitars and Vilnis Strods on drums and percussion. In the 2003 year of its release it reached 17th place in the World Music Charts Europe, and was praised as one of the top twenty world music albums of the year.

"What do you know of the island of Reunion, which lies west of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean? Little, probably, beyond the fact that its local people produce sugar, and that rich tourists bask in the sun. If you listen to Digdig, you'll get a whole new perspective: what that globe-trotting guitarist Bob Brozman has done in this particular collaboration is to celebrate an intoxicating musical style entirely different from any other. His musical guru here is the multi-talented René Lacaille, who moves effortlessly between the guitar, accordion, and sundry percussion instruments as well as singing the local ballads; what these two musicians get up to together has irresistible charm. Their duets are fast and fluent, and when backed by Lacaille's percussionist go at a dizzy pace. As befits an island with global links, there are echoes of many other musics here--French, Latin-American, Arab, Portuguese--but they all combine into a gloriously heady brew. The songs seem casually tossed off like improvisations, but you can sense the intricate work which has gone into these dazzling instrumental tracks. This CD is seriously addictive."

Michael Church

Album DescriptionL'Ile de la Réunion is the alluring volcanic island situated 600 miles east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean and is home to a vibrant culture that is passionate, joyous, sexy and rhythmic. 'Digdig' unlocks the shimmering beauty of this island's music with this magical collaboration between Réunion's accomplished accordionist and guitarist René Lacaille and the guitarist and musical explorer, Bob Brozman.

Colonised by the French 300 years ago who brought slaves from Africa, Madagascar and India mixed with Chinese and Arab immigrants, Réunion has a unique and rich cultural diversity suffused with hybrid vigour and influenced by the forces of nature.

Bob Brozman has dedicated the last twenty years to playing, researching and recording music from numerous islands around the world. He has found that, worldwide, island music resonates with the joy of immediate living, the sorrow of colonial history, and the strength of the people overcoming hardship. It was only a matter of time before the ethnomusicologist and king of the Hawaiian slide guitar stopped off at La Réunion. Brozman and Lacaille began playing together as soon as they met and struck up a great friendship. Brozman says of Lacaille: `the unique musical styles of La Réunion contain some of the world's richest and most soulful sounds. René brings to this already complex music a new level of fiery creativity and innovation, both in composition and in playing'.

Brozman's guitars weave effortlessly through the invigorating tracks that are almost all composed by Lacaille. 'Digdig' is as diverse as it is vibrant and full of humour, mixing the traditional Réunionnais styles of sega (influenced by the French colonists) and maloya (its older African form) with jazz and Southern American blues.

"The concept of this debut album from Spain's leading roots ensemble is that you are listening to a radio broadcast in Tarifa, Spain's southernmost point, so that you might hear a mixture of sounds from Spain and North Africa. And indeed fuzzy, distant radio sounds introduce one song and close the album. The album features an incredible variety of instruments, including among many others: guitar, tar (Persian lute), buzuki (Greek mandolin), derbouka (North African clay drum), ney (Arabic flute), crumhorn (a loud, buzzing Medieval wind instrument), and the Indian harmonium. The group is not shy about including modern popular instruments like soprano and tenor saxophone, electric organ, and electric bass. The album features almost as many styles as it does instruments, yet they tend to come together as one new style, rather than sounding like a musical salad. The album starts off with the title track, a smooth mix of rumba and flamenco. "Oye, China" is a love lament that plays the layered clip-clop rhythm of the plucked instruments off the more continuous sounds of the accordion and the breathy nsuri (Indian bamboo flute). "Lamma bada" is a straight reading of one of the most oft-played tunes of the Arab world, using Radio Tarifa's favored instruments, retaining the song's modal structure (i.e., all the instruments, even the bass, playing the same line at once). One song later in the album stands out from all the rest. It is an adaptation of a song by a Medieval troubadour named Walter von der Vogelweide originally called "Nu Alrest Lebe Ich Mir Werde," but which Radio Tarifa simply calls "Nu Alrest." Dominated by the crumhorns and the melancholy tenor of Javier Raibal, "Nu Alrest" carries a potent charge of fantasy and sadness, conjuring images of crossing the desert alone on camel. It is imagination like this that makes Rumba Argelina one of the most important world music albums of the 1990s."

Romano Drom practises music as a freedom. A way of discovering, accessing and sharing the world. Far from confining themselves to a gypsy folklore often claimed by the "gadgés", the Antal Kovács father and son group makes capital of new tones and instruments, common elsewhere but unusual in the Hungarian Olahs tradition which often includes 'domestic percussion' played on aluminium pots, spoons and other utensils in support of the singing. This process may seem obvious to a number of musicians. For them, when one understands the hard nature of their lives and the fact that they are always torn between their loaded tradition and the clarion call of post-modernity, it becomes a question of demanding work from the ferryman of culture. These few songs encapsulate this transition and Romano Drom is at the forefront of this new generation of gypsy music.

On this album, the Zydepunks play big, barnstorming dance songs—massive, stomping, thumping, sweaty things with a piratical accordion played by a woman in a miniskirt and black stockings who is known in the publicity as Eve: no surname. If the musicians were performing this music live, then the floorboards would be shaking under the feet of the dancers, every ant in the room would be shooting out of its crevice or crack and running for safer ground. Beverages would fly.

Finisterre hits a good balance between keeping the music boisterous and genuine-sounding, and leaving it clear enough to be intelligible. In that room with its shaking floorboards, the pure amount of sound pouring down on you, around you, up from the floor, might dissolve everything in a slamming roar, but with Finisterre you can focus your mind on each instrument and hear a precision there that submerges itself in the whole. Listen to the fiddle in “When My Ship Sails Away”. It picks out each note with the exactness of an embroidery needle stabbing through canvas. At the end of “One More Chance”, it corkscrews itself neatly into a squeak.

The group formed in New Orleans in 2003 and has been based there ever since. Finisterre is its fourth album after 2004’s 9th Ward Ramblers, 2005’s ...And the Streets Will Flow with Whiskey, and last year’s Exile Waltz. Hurricane Katrina disrupted the lineup slightly, but the music doesn’t seem to have suffered. The musicians draw on several different folk traditions for their sound: klezmer here, Cajun there, Irish or English somewhere else. There’s zydeco too, obviously. The easiest thing to compare them to would be the Pogues, but Pogues with a strong New Orleans flavour and a singer who sounds raspy but not drunk. They have that same folk-for-the-hell-of-it vibe. Pub folk. They even sing about whiskey.

In the liner notes to this, her first album, renowned Romany-Moravian vocalist and pianist Ida Kelarova dedicates her first album to the memory of her father, a Gypsy musician. This release is full of all pain of her father's death and her Moravian mother's rejection of Ida's Gypsy heritage. Track six, "Joj Mamo," is an old Gypsy song about motherly love which takes on the significance of a hymn as Kelarova ignores the original rhythmic arrangement and is carried by pure, desperate emotion. Keralova says,"When my father died, I could not cry, but I was singing, and I have sung ever since. He always told me, "Open your throat, open your heart, do not fear anything and sing."

Istvánfi Balázs belongs to the new generation of Hungarian bagpipers. He taught bag pipe playing at the Hungarian Folk Music School in Obuda, and also makes them. He is a member of the Kalamona Band and often joins the Hungarian Bagpipe Orchestra in concert as well as playing solo.

In the last piece on this CD he pays homage to Béla Bartók, who without his tireless research work into folk music the Hungarian bagpipe tradition would be significantly poorer today.

The first album of the band (Klezz Jazz) released in 2003. The lovers of folk, jazz and world music will all enjoy the nine songs this album contains.

The members of NIGUN, who don’t go only in for the same music but they are also friends, are mixing Jewish music (klezmer, sephard, folk-sacral) with jazz and free-improvisational elements.

"Impressive klezmer-inflected jazz set from a Hungarian band with some serious chops. Alto player Janos Vazsonyi reminds me of Lee Konitz at his fiery best, while clarinetist Daniel Vaezi has a lot of Perry Robinson going on. Great rhythm section work and inventive approach to oft-recorded pieces like 'Shnirele Perele."

"MAKÁM Group is the most characteristic Hungarian representative of the New Tradition. Its landmarks are eleven albums. Its music spans tradition and modernity, the East and the West, the duality of the collective and the individual and search for the ancient harmony.The group which was founded by Zoltán Krulik, broke into musical life here as the Eastern Central European follower of the ethno-avantgarde trend, this period was nuanced by Asian, Far Eastern roots as well as Balkan, African effects or repetitive elements of contemporary music.

The latest period of MAKÁM Group (SkanZen, 2000; 9 Colinda, 2001; Sindbad, 2001 - Fonó Records; Anzix, 2003 - FolkEuropa) is characterised by the rediscovery of the archaic forms of Hungarian folk music and that of the song first of all.The legacy of Bartók and Kodály, the synthesis of elements of archaic cultures and contemporary age is the unchanged musical credo of the MAKÁM Group.The Makám ensemble was formed in 1984 with the purpose of establishing a peculiar form of community played music, and trying to show the common characteristics existing in music cultures of different peoples and contrasting musical forms. This is a sort of improvisative chamber music containing the elements of classical music as well a contemporary jazz and rock. Its melody and rhythm are influenced by East-European ethno and Oriental music. Beleiving that the ancient Hungarian folk music is deeply related to Eastern traditions, the group arrivedat cultures geographically far away from Hungary.The name of the group, Makám, is a word of Persian-Arabic origin, referring to the structural signif icance in improvisational music. Particular chords in the band's style are due to the rarely heard rhythms and melodies on one hand, and, on the other to the original collective sound of instruments never experienced in the same way before. Besides the classical instrments such as saxophnes, clarinet, oboe, guitar, double-bass, the tunable tabla and two ancient instruments, the Balkanien kaval (wind instrument) and the Indian ghatam play an important role in the group's sounding.

Furthermore, several exotic stringed instruments plucked with a plectrum, and percussion instruments, such as marimba, kalimba, bamboo sansas, ektar, talking drum and bells, colour the harmony of the music. Most of these instruments are made by the group's idly on the original function of the instruments but tries to explore new possibilities in playing techniques, tonality and soring. They have made many discs and radio recordings of classical music and etno contemporary music in Hungary and abroad, and have given concerts in festivals, concert halls and jazz clubs throughout Western Europe with great success. The Makám is a most exciting creative group of the latest years. It has attracted attention to an impovisational, accord combining elements of contemporery music as well as jazz and rock with the roots of Eastern European, Asiatic and Balkan folk. Its name was once linked to that of the Kolinda already world-famous at the time. By now, it has become a determinative formation in world music."

9 Colinda:"Kolinda is the comprehensive name of pastorals as well as Christmas carols, Nativity and new year songs in the Roumanian – and Slavic – speaking countries in Eastern Europe and the Balkan. It has its roots in the Middle Ages, coming from the Latin world calendae. It has been found in Polish manuscripts since the XIIth century. Kolinda texts and functions have never had an exclusively ecclesiastic character. The songs have been of Roumanian children going begging from door to door – just like Christmas carol singers in Hungary – and of Polish people playing the Nativity or tending a flock. Kolinda tunes were treated by Chopin as well as Bartók."

01.Mennyei szép hajnal - Heavenly beautiful dawn 02.Hajdan rég - Once for a long time 03.Ő jön a szánon - He comes on the sleigh 04.Hull a tél haja - The hair of the winter is falling 05.Magnificat 06.Ó jöjj, ó jöjj - Oh come, oh come 07.Földből lettünk - From an Earth we were 08.Mikor a messiás - When the Messiah 09.Hajda a szélben - Hajda in the wind

Leningrad is a Russian ska punk band from Saint Petersburg.Composed of 14 members, the band appeared in the late 1990s around singer Sergey "Shnur" Shnurov. It soon became famous for its vulgar lyrics , the main reason it was avoided by most radio stations at first. But this did not stop its growing popularity. As Shnurov said himself: "Our songs are just about the good sides of life, vodka and girls that is." The band is known to be disliked by Moscow mayor Yuriy Luzhkov, who cancelled many of their concerts in the city. But since then, the band has made its way to radio and TV, with Shnurov even presenting some New Year's Eve TV shows.

In 2001 he recorded the album 'Made in Zhopa' with the project Tri Debila. Tri Debila was a sort of mini band for small clubs featuring vocals, tuba, accordion and drums. Although this turned out to be only a spontaneous short time project, the songs are an essential part of the Leningrad oeuvre.